Family buys back DuraCraft brand

Bill and Chick Ward established DuraCraft in 1945, but the family sold the business in 1984. Since then, the DuraCraft name has been bought and sold multiple times.

In 1992, a third generation of Wards — Mike and John Ward — decided to keep the family’s boatbuilding tradition alive by starting War Eagle Boats. After forming a partnership with Ducks Unlimited in the late 1990s, War Eagle became a premium watercraft for duck hunters across the Southeast.

In 2011, DuraCraft was sold in a liquidation proceeding, giving the Ward family the opportunity to buy back the DuraCraft name.

“We were given a chance to buy back the DuraCraft name started by my grandfather, and we jumped on it,” Team Ward Inc. president Mike Ward said in a statement. “At one time the DuraCraft brand stood as the pinnacle of quality aluminum products in the marine industry, and we at Team Ward look forward to restoring the Ward family’s rich heritage of customer satisfaction to the DuraCraft name.”

The Marine Industries Association of South Florida and the Marine Industry Cares Foundation, organizers of the 41st Annual Broward County Waterway Cleanup held on March 3, collected 32 tons of trash from 31 sites around the county.